Tag: United States
One more failure
I’d like to revise my judgment yesterday that the appointment of Richard Grenell as Special Presidential Envoy for Serbia and Kosovo Peace Negotiations is bizarre. It is likely worse than that, possibly even tragic. I hasten to add that I have not talked with the White House about it. There is no point: they lie too much for me to rely on anything they say.
A few things are nevertheless clear. Grenell is a John Bolton protege and far right advocate who has gone out of his way to offend his German hosts. If you wanted to make common cause with Europe in the Balkans, Grenell is the last American you would choose for the task. The Germans have made it clear they will not accept land swaps in the Balkans. Bolton was an advocate of land swaps between Kosovo and Serbia. The logic was compelling for an ethnic nationalist: Serbs want to be governed by Serbs and Albanians by Albanians. Anything else is too hard. Equal rights is liberal democratic clap trap, at home and abroad.
In addition, land swaps would kill two Clinton accomplishments with one blow: Kosovo will become the eastern province of Albania, sooner or later, and Bosnia and Herzegovina will be partitioned. Don’t worry about how many people will be displaced or die in the process, or even the radicalization of the Bosnian Muslims if they are forced into a rump Islamic Republic. Serbia will be so delighted to gain northern Kosovo as well as Republika Srpska that it will love the Americans again. It might even be possible to cut a deal with the Russians to recognize the annexation of Crimea in exchange for UN membership for rump Kosovo, which won’t matter for long as it will join Albania in due course. That is the kind of crude ethnonationalist logic the Administration is applying elsewhere, in particular to Israel and Palestine. Why not in the Balkans?
What does this mean for the good people of Serbia, Kosovo, and Bosnia? Pandora’s box will be opened with the border changes:
- Serbs will leave from south of the Ibar in Kosovo,
- Albanians will be pushed out of Serbia,
- Muslims will try to seize Brcko in Bosnia to prevent partition there,
- Bosnian Croats will declare the re-creation of their Herzeg-Bosna parastate.
In short, this is a formula for destabilization of the Balkans, precisely what the Russians have sought. Is it any wonder that the Trump Administration might try to deliver it?
Ironically, Secretary of State Pompeo* has been visiting Macedonia and Montenegro, the two newest members of NATO. He’ll get an earful there about the dangers that lurk in any land swap arrangement. Montenegro, because it has been governed for many years with the support of minorities, is not so much in danger, though quite a few of its Albanians might like to join Kosovo and most of its Serbs remain opposed to its independence. Macedonia is certainly at risk if some sort of land swap becomes a reality, even if many Albanians there will be reluctant to lose their sweet power-sharing arrangement in Skopje.
You might think the Trump Administration has enough trouble of its own making in the Middle East, Ukraine, North Korea, China, Venezuela and half a dozen other places, without reviving the zombie idea of land swaps in the Balkans. But they seem determined, with Grenell’s appointment, to add the Balkans to the list of their foreign policy failures.
*The original post said it was Vice President Pence. Apologies for my mistake.
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Stevenson’s army, October 4
Extra weekend reading: the Volker testimony to the House committees; the texts released by the House committee chairs.
The texts show a bureaucratic political game, as described in the first part of this Post column: twice Amb. Sondland, a political appointee who donated $1 million to the Trump inaugural committee, tries to cut off Amb. Taylor, the career official now acting ambassador [charge] in Kyiv, when Taylor raises the link between military aid and investigating the Bidens. But after Taylor raises the point a second time, Sondland very formally gets into the record “there is no quid pro quo.” You can read; you decide.
CJR has a good explanation of how hard this issue is for the news media.
I especially liked this section: The press, on the whole, does not consistently use language commensurate with overt wrongdoing. (The Times’s print headline this morning, calling Trump’s admission a “brash public move,” is a case in point; so was Jonathan Karl’s claim, on ABC, that “this is becoming less a question of what the president did than a debate over what is right and what is wrong.”) As journalists, we’ve been taught to believe that the biggest scandals are those that require intense, meticulous digging; as human beings, we’ve been taught to believe that no right-minded person would own up to wrongdoing in such a haphazard way. And so, as ever with Trump, we seek rationality in the irrational. The effect, as the Washington Post’s Ashley Parker wrote recently, is that “Trump’s penchant for reading the stage directions almost seems to inoculate him from the kind of political damage that would devastate other politicians….
When it comes to Trump and his media supporters, shamelessness and misinformation are two sides of the same coin. The more shameless Trump is, the less we can see the boundaries between right and wrong, between believable and unbelievable. If you’ll say anything, nothing is implausible, which, in turn, makes a wild conspiracy sound just as plausible as the truth. Someday, the house of cards might collapse. But not today.
Yesterday I noted the pro-oil decision that angered farmers. Today the administration made a pro-farmer announcement on ethanol.
So far only CNN seems to have the story that Trump told Xi in June that he would go easy on Hong Kong while the trade talks continued.
Earlier this week, I noted that NYT said the administration actually did a cost estimate on Trump’s suggestion of a border moat filled with snakes and alligators. We haven’t seen that estimate. Maybe it’s on the supersecret WH server. But Peter Singer, tongue in cheek, has his own estimate, roughly $2.5 billion in set-up costs, plus annual operating costs of $1.8 billion.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I plan to republish here. If you want to get it directly, To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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Bizarre
I got into the office this morning to find this in my email:
President Donald J. Trump Announces Intent to Appoint Individual to a Key Administration Post
President Donald J. Trump today announced his intent to appoint the following individual to a key position in his Administration:
Richard Grenell of California to serve concurrently as Special Presidential Envoy for Serbia and Kosovo Peace Negotiations and Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the United States of America to the Federal Republic of Germany.
That, plus multiple requests to comment from outlets that broadcast in the Balkans.
So I’ll try to do that here: it’s bizarre. I had assumed that the recent appointment of Matt Palmer as Special Representative for the Balkans, if it did anything, ensured that no one else would get the job of resolving the remaining issues between Kosovo and Serbia as well as within Bosnia and Herzegovina. Now the Administration has chosen to name in addition a controversial political figure who has managed to deeply offend Berlin, one of America’s most important allies, to handle the sensitive issues in the Belgrade/Pristina talks.
What does that signify?
To me, it communicates confusion and disorder in US policy, not the clarity of purpose and desire to cooperate with the European Union that is required. What might the relationship between Palmer and Grenell be? I don’t know. Political appointee Grenell clearly outranks professional diplomat Palmer because he has an ambassadorial title (never mind he is presumably closer to the White House), but if one has the Balkans and the other has the Pristina/Belgrade dialogue, the logical chain of command would be the opposite.
In short: this is an appointment likely to cause even more uncertainty about US policy than already prevails. I suggest the press try to get Palmer and Grenell to clarify. Not me.
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Peace Picks | October 7 – 11
A Vision for the Future of Missile Defense | October 7, 2019 | 9:30 am – 12:00 pm | 1616 Rhode Island Avenue, NW Washington, DC 20036 | Register Here
The CSIS Missile Defense Project is pleased to welcome Vice Admiral Jon Hill, Director of the Missile Defense Agency, to speak on his vision and intent for the Agency. An industry panel will follow his remarks.
Event Schedule
9:30-10:30 Conversation between VADM Jon Hill and Dr. Tom Karako, Director, Missile Defense Project.
10:30-10:40 Coffee break
10:40-12:00 Panel discussion featuring Sarah
Reeves, Vice President of Missile Defense Programs, Lockheed Martin
Space, John Schumacher, Vice President, Washington Operations,
Aerojet Rocketdyne, Paul Smith, Vice President and Program
Director of GMD, Boeing, Dr. Mitch Stevison, Vice President,
Raytheon Missile Systems, and Brig. Gen. Kenn Todorov (USAF, ret.), Vice
President of Missile Defense Solutions, Northrop Grumman Corporation.
More than a Wallet: The Role of the Private Sector in Development | October 7, 2019 | 10:00 am – 11:30 am | 1616 Rhode Island Avenue, NW Washington, DC 20036 | Register Here
The international community predominately sees the private sector as the answer to the gap in financing for the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), but what other roles can the private sector play in development? Large multinational corporations have been operating in some of the most fragile contexts for years and could offer technical assistance to NGOs and aid agencies. The private sector also supplies 9 out of 10 jobs in developing countries and can help encourage foreign direct investment. Development agencies could also learn from the private sector’s longstanding and resilient value chains throughout emerging markets. This event will explore these topics and feature representatives from the U.S. government, multinational corporations, SMEs, and development practitioners.
FEATURING
CEO, CollaborateUp
Senior Vice President, Middle East and North Africa, Chemonics International
Senior Advisor, mClinica
Private Sector Engagement Coordinator, USAID
New Strategic Visions and Power Competition in the Middle East |October 8, 2019 | 9:00 am | Atlantic Council, 1030 15th St NW, 12th Floor, Washington, DC 20005 | Register Here
In collaboration with the Italian Institute for International Political Studies (ISPI) and the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, the conference will discuss new strategic visions and power competition in the Middle East. The event is organized within the framework of the fifth edition of MED – Rome Mediterranean Dialogues, which will take place later this year in Rome.
The growing power of China and the renewed assertiveness of Russia seem to be a prelude to a new phase of depreciation of Western impact on the rest of the world, if not the opening of a great competition for the redistribution of power and international status. In the context of this global reassessment, the configuration of regional orders has come into question, illustrated by the current collapse of the Middle Eastern order. The idea of a “Russian resurgence’” in the Middle East set against an American withdrawal has captured the attention of policymakers and scholars alike and warrants further examination of renewed power competition in the region.
We hope you will join us for this important event, which will also mark the release of a new collected volume, “The MENA Region: A Great Power Competition,” edited by Karim Mezran and Arturo Varvelli.
9:00 a.m. Introductory remarks
Amb. Giampiero Massolo
President
Italian Institute for International Political Studies (ISPI)
H.E. Armando Varicchio
Ambassador
Embassy of Italy to the United States
9:30 a.m. Update on current US strategy toward the region
Mr. David Schenker
Assistant Secretary, Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs
US Department of State
10:15 a.m. Transatlantic foreign policy in the MENA region
Amb. Barbara Leaf
Senior Fellow
The Washington Institute
Dr. Haizam Amirah-Fernández
Senior Analyst
Elcano Royal Institute
Mr. William Wechsler
Director, Rafik Hariri Center & Middle East Programs
Atlantic Council
11:40 a.m. New policies for old actors: Russia, China, Iran, and Turkey
Dr. Jon Alterman
Director, Middle East Program
Center for Strategic and International Studies
Dr. Mark N. Katz
Nonresident Senior Fellow
Atlantic Council
Dr. Aniseh Bassiri Tabrizi
Research Fellow
Royal United Services Institute
Dr. Gönül Tol
Director, Center for Turkish Studies
Middle East Institute
1:00 p.m. Lunch Served
1:20 – 2:30 p.m. Keynote Address: A new strategic vision for the United States
Gen. Joseph Votel
Former Commander
US Central Command (CENTCOM)
Moderators
Dr. Karim Mezran
Senior Fellow, Rafik Hariri Center for the Middle East
Atlantic Council
Dr. Arturo Varvelli
Senior Research Fellow and Co-Head, Middle East and North Africa Center
ISPI
The Global Challenge of Political Polarization | October 8, 2019 | 12:15 pm – 1:45 pm | 1779 Massachusetts Avenue NW Washington, DC 20036 | Register Here
Political polarization is tearing at the seams of democracies around the world, from Bangladesh, Brazil, and India, to Poland, Turkey, and the United States. Why is polarization coming to a boil in so many different places at once? Is polarization similar everywhere or marked by substantial differences? How can severely divided democracies restore at least some national political consensus? Are there relevant lessons for the United States from polarized democracies elsewhere? Thomas Carothers will address these questions, drawing on the new book he has co-edited with Andrew O’Donohue, Democracies Divided: The Global Challenge of Political Polarization. Anne Applebaum, Naomi Hossain, and Sarah Yerkes will provide in-depth perspectives on key country cases.
THOMAS CAROTHERS
Thomas Carothers is senior vice president for studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. In that capacity he oversees all of the research programs at Carnegie. He also directs the Democracy, Conflict, and Governance Program and carries out research and writing on democracy-related issues.
ANNE APPLEBAUM
Anne Applebaum is a columnist for the Washington Post and a Pulitzer-prize winning historian. She is also a senior fellow at the Stavros Niarchos Foundation Agora Institute at Johns Hopkins University.
NAOMI HOSSAIN
Naomi Hossain is a political sociologist at the Institute of Development Studies, Sussex, currently based at the Accountability Research Center at American University. She is the author of The Aid Lab: Understanding Bangladesh’s Unexpected Success.
SARAH YERKES
Sarah Yerkes is a fellow in Carnegie’s Middle East Program, where her research focuses on Tunisia’s political, economic, and security developments as well as state-society relations in the Middle East and North Africa.
CARLOS LOZADA
Carlos Lozada is the nonfiction book
critic of the Washington Post and a Carnegie Endowment visiting
scholar. He is also an adjunct professor of political journalism with the
University of Notre Dame’s Washington program.
Trade, Development, and Security: A Discussion on the Potential of a US-Egypt Free Trade Agreement | October 9, 2019 | 9:00 am – 10:30 am | Middle East Institute, 1763 N St. NW Washington, District of Columbia 20036 | Register Here
The Middle East Institute (MEI) is pleased to host an event addressing the possibility of a US-Egypt Free Trade Agreement within the wider context of Egyptian development, economy, and security. A US-Egypt Free Trade Agreement has been under discussion, on and off, for the better part of two decades. A new report launched by MEI, “Trade, Reform and Revitalization: Towards a Free Trade Agreement,” finds that a free trade agreement would be mutually beneficial, but its success will depend on the adoption of the kind of reforms integral to the growth of Egypt’s economy. Without vibrant growth, powered by an active private sector, Egypt’s economy may falter, affecting its political and economic stability and security.
To address this topic, CEO of the AmCham Egypt Inc in
Egypt Hisham Fahmy will be accompanied by Deborah Lehr,
CEO of Basilinna, and Mirette F. Mabrouk, the director of MEI’s
Egypt Studies program. Ambassador Gerald Feierstein, MEI’s senior
Vice President, will moderate the discussion.
Belt and Road in Latin America: Where does the future lie? | October 9, 2019 | 9:00 am – 10:30 am| 1030 15th St NW 12th Floor, Washington DC, 20005 | Register Here
Over the past six years, China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) has expanded across the globe, drawing varied reactions ranging from full-on support to deep-running skepticism. Latin America and the Caribbean, long considered peripheral to the BRI, is increasingly engaging with the initiative – 19 countries have already signed on. As BRI continues to evolve, what are some new areas and trends to watch? What are the implications of BRI for regional governments and the business community? In what ways could BRI affect the United States and its interests?
Join the Atlantic Council’s Adrienne Arsht Latin America Center on Wednesday, October 9, 2019, from 9:00 a.m. to 10:30 a.m. (EDT) for a high-level conversation on the BRI in Latin America and its implications for the region.
*Speakers to be Announced*
By, With, and Through: A Closer Look at CENTCOM’s Approach in the Middle East | October 10, 2019 | 12:30 pm – 2:00 pm | Middle East Institute, 1763 N Street NW, Washington, District of Columbia 20036 | Register Here
The effective prosecution of America’s new global priority of competing with China and Russia requires the reallocation of U.S. military resources from the Middle East to the Indo-Pacific region and elsewhere. This in turn places a higher premium on U.S. security cooperation with partners in the Middle East.
U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM)’s “By, With, and Through” approach can help further the goals of security cooperation and specifically develop closer ties with partner forces in the region. But is it working? And if it isn’t, what are the main challenges both at home and abroad, and what will it take to generate better results?
The Middle East Institute (MEI) is pleased to convene a
panel of experts to reflect on this subject. Bilal Y. Saab, MEI’s Senior
Fellow and Director of the Defense and Security Program, will discuss some of
the key findings of an upcoming publication in the 2019 Fall issue of The
Washington Quarterly entitled, “Broken Partnerships: Can Washington
Get Security Cooperation Right?.” He will be joined by General Joseph
Votel, former CENTCOM Commander and currently a nonresident distinguished
senior fellow at MEI; Dana Stroul, senior fellow in The Washington
Institute’s Beth and David Geduld Program on Arab Politics; and Kenneth
Pollack, author of Armies of Sand: The Past, Present, and Future of Arab
Military Effectiveness and a resident scholar at the American Enterprise
Institute. The conversation will be moderated by Eric Schmitt of
the New York Times.
Elections, Peace Talks, and U.S. Policy: What’s Next for Afghanistan? | October 10, 2019 |1:00 pm — 2:30 pm | One Woodrow Wilson Plaza 1300 Pennsylvania Ave. NW, Washington, DC 20004 6th Floor, Woodrow Wilson Center | Register Here
Eighteen years after U.S. forces entered Afghanistan, the country is not only still at war—it is also in a state of flux. Its political future is uncertain, with the final results of a September 28 presidential election not expected until November. The fate of a fledgling peace and reconciliation process has been unclear since U.S. President Donald Trump called off talks with the Taliban. The direction of U.S. policy, and particularly the future American military presence, is also a major question. This event will take stock of Afghanistan’s various challenges amid so much uncertainty; discuss what we can expect to see in the coming weeks and months; and consider the best—and worst—ways forward for Kabul and Washington.
Speakers
Independent Consultant
Director, Center for Stability and Development, CNA Corporation
Journalist and TV Host, Voice of America
Senior Program Officer for Afghanistan, U.S. Institute of Peace
Social Activist and Co-Founder, Her Afghanistan
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Wishful thinking
There is so much wrong with President Trump’s behavior relative to his phone call with Ukrainian President Zelensky that it begs for enumeration:
- He solicited foreign help for his election campaign.
- He used his public position to enhance his private interests.
- He suggested a connection between Ukraine’s cooperation in replying to his request for a favor and his willingness to allow Congressionally-mandated aid to go to Ukraine.
- He or his immediate subordinates attempted to cover all this up by hiding the record of the phone conversation in a highly classified computer system explicitly not intended for this type of material.
- He subsequently has threatened the life and freedom of the whistleblower who drew attention to the malfeasance.
There is little question but that this behavior merits impeachment, along with lots of other things he has done. These include the obstruction of justice that Special Counsel Mueller documented in detail and his public appeal for Russian help in the 2016 election, not to mention his preference for believing President Putin over US intelligence agencies. We haven’t even begun to see a serious investigation of Trump’s finances, which will almost surely provide more impeachment fodder.
Impeachment in the House is a foregone conclusion now. The only real questions are when will it happen and how will the Senate react thereafter?
Speaker Pelosi has a choice between early impeachment, say late this year or early next, and late impeachment, late enough so that the Senate would not be able to conduct the trial before the November 3 election. It is not clear to me what she will choose, and perhaps she hasn’t decided yet. Processes of this sort have their own rhythm, which is likely slower than some would like. But if it appears that Republicans would back impeachment and conviction, Pelosi might try to move fast to take advantage of the momentum.
How will the Republicans react? So far the members of both House and Senate are circling the wagons, trying to protect Trump. Polling confirms that choice. But that could change. The rash of Republican retirements from the House is clearly due in part to discomfort with Trump and his likely impact on members’ prospects in the 2020 election. There have been a few similar announced retirements from the Senate, but there the defensive phalanx seems much better organized and grounded. Mitt Romney is everyone’s best hope for breaking ranks, but he has so far been cautious to a fault.
Trump remains defiant and unapologetic. His phone call was “perfect” and his opponents’ claims are fake news. He is good at counter-punching, but my sense is that most Americans are getting tired of the reality show. That, of course, is wishful thinking on my part.
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Imbalanced Region
On September 20 the United States Institute of Peace (USIP) hosted a panel discussion entitled “Red Sea Rivalries: Middle East Competition in the Horn of Africa” to introduce and discuss a new report from the International Crisis Group (ICG) on the influence of Gulf Countries on the Horn of Africa. Opening remarks were delivered by Ambassador Johnnie Carson and Robert Malley, President of ICG. Elizabeth Dickinson, ICG’s Arabian peninsula analyst and Dino Mahtani, ICG’s Africa program deputy director outlined the report’s findings. UN advisor Nicholas Haysom, African Union Chief of Staff to the High-Level Implementation Panel Abdul Mohammad, and former Egyptian Ambassador Hesham Youssef provided commentary.
Malley described three key findings: first, the Gulf must stop exporting its conflicts to the Red Sea region; second, the Red Sea countries should negotiate collectively with the Gulf; and third, Western countries have a role to play in these conflicts but have only recently begun to do so.
Dickinson argued that Gulf competition in the Red Sea region is part of wider strategy throughout North Africa and the Sahel. Qatar and the UAE-Saudi alliance’s interventions in Sudan are related to its actions in Chad and Niger, the three countries bordering the stronghold of the UAE’s Libya proxy General Haftar. She also argued that the Gulf countries do not consider the Horn of Africa part of a different continent in which they are foreign meddlers. Rather, they think of the Red Sea as part of their region and their role in it as a natural extension of longstanding historical ties.
Mahtani emphasized that he is cautiously optimistic about the prospect of a stable dynamic between Gulf countries and domestic actors in Sudan. The killing of 120 people in Khartoum in June by General Hemeti’s forces pushed his Emirati and Saudi backers to show contrition. In July, an attempted coup by Qatar-backed members of Sudan’s military showed that Hemeti faced strong enough opposition to prevent him from ruling through coercion alone. Mahtani argued that this reality may push the UAE to compromise with Qatar on Sudan. This could lay the groundwork for future cooperation between the two countries on their overall plans for Sudan’s post-Bashir development.
Mahtani contrasted this to the situation in Somalia, where the federal government in Mogadishu is aligned with Qatar while regional political leaders receive support from the UAE and Saudi Arabia. He also described the UAE’s indirect support of al-Shabab through purchases of Somali charcoal, a significant source of funding for the militant group. In exchange, al-Shabab has increased the number of their attacks this summer and targeted a delegation of Qataris and Somali federal government employees, acting as “subcontractors for political violence.” Several panelists agreed that the Gulf rivalries have contributed to political fragmentation and violence in Somalia and will likely continue to do so indefinitely.
Both Dickinson and Mahtani emphasized the role that multilateralism can play in addressing the power asymmetry between the Gulf countries and those in the Horn of Africa. They argued that Horn of Africa countries can increase their bargaining power by negotiating jointly with the Gulf through regional multilateral organizations like the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) or the African Union. The United States rarely involves itself but when it does it can make a big difference to the effectiveness of these multilateral discussions. In Sudan, the Quad talks among the United States, United Kingdom, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE facilitated the power sharing compromise.
Mohammad agreed that Africa’s strong tradition of multilateralism could benefit the countries of the Horn of Africa and added that it could provide an example of positive multilateral relations to the Gulf countries. He argued that while Gulf countries have weaponized the GCC against each other in recent years, adopting an African-inspired culture of multilateralism could provide a means to transcend conflict in the Middle East. Hesham agreed that multilateralism in this part of the world is important but argued that it will not solve the problem of asymmetry in the bilateral relationships between Gulf states and Horn of Africa countries.
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